Cranberry Apple Baked Oatmeal

One of the reasons I love this time of year is that I can find fresh cranberries in the grocery store! Those tart little berries are so much fun to cook with. They have the prettiest bright red color and provide a pucker worthy pop of flavor to whatever dish you put them in.

This autumn inspired baked oatmeal is just as easy and NOM-worthy as all my other baked oatmeal recipes. It takes just a few minutes to stir the ingredients together and then the oven does the rest of the work. The end result is a soft, custard-like oatmeal that is just a little sweet and a lot filling. The fresh cranberries give this baked oatmeal a sweet-tart flavor that are sure to wake up your taste buds. When it’s done baking, simply divide the oatmeal up into single portions and you’ve got ready-to-reheat breakfast for the rest of the week!

I do hope that I never run out of flavor combinations to try with baked oatmeal… It’s just SO good!

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. In a large bowl, whisk together the apple sauce, eggs, brown sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, salt, and baking powder until smooth. Add the milk and whisk until smooth again.

Rinse the cranberries in a colander. Slice or roughly chop the cranberries in half (they don't have to be perfect). Stir the cranberries and oats into the applesauce mixture.

Pour the oatmeal mixture into an 8x8 or 9x9 casserole dish (coated with non-stick spray). Bake in the preheated oven for 45 minutes, or until the surface is a light golden brown and it is no longer sticky in the center. Serve hot or refrigerate until ready to eat.

Step by Step Photos

Begin preheating the oven to 375 degrees. In a large bowl, whisk together the apple sauce, eggs, brown sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, salt, and baking powder. Once those are whisked smooth, add the milk and whisk until smooth again.

I used half of this 12 oz. bag, which was about 1 1/4 cups. What did I do with the rest? I froze them! I’ll use them later in some muffins or something (or maybe another batch of this oatmeal!).

Give the cranberries a good rinse in a colander. Take about a handful at a time and place them on a cutting board. Slice them in half or roughly chop them so that they’re at least sliced open. They don’t have to be perfect, so I wouldn’t suggest slicing them one by one. You just want to open them up so that the juices will be released as they bake. And be careful, those little suckers like to roll around!

Stir the dry oats and cranberries into the apple sauce mixture with a spoon.

Pour the oatmeal mixture into an 8×8 or 9×9 inch casserole dish. You might want to coat that dish with non-stick spray.

Bake for 45 minutes, or until the top is light golden brown and it’s no longer sticky in the middle.

I’m a fan of your baked oatmeals in general, and this one and the pumpkin spice one are my favorites. I’ve made them both a few times now, and wanted to share some of the tweaks I’ve made over time.

I drop the brown sugar from 1/4 cup (equal to 4 Tbsp) down to 3 Tbsp. I mix 2 of the tablespoons in at the beginning, and the third tablespoon I put in the food processor with the cranberries, rather than chopping them by hand. It’s a lot faster to chop them this way (just don’t go overboard!), and pulsing them directly with the sugar sweetens the cranberries directly. It’s an America’s Test Kitchen trick, although they suggest pulsing the berries with a pinch of salt as well. I’ve also used frozen cranberries successfully instead of fresh.

I couldn’t get this to bake evenly (or in only 45 minutes) in an 8″ x 8″ pan. Since I don’t have a 9″ x 9″ pan, I’ve been using a 7″ x 11″ glass baking dish, and that’s been working great. Last night, I tried dropping the temperature to 350 and using convection, and I got a perfect bake in 45 minutes. I’ve also made these in jumbo muffin tins before when I wanted to store them in the freezer for later, and that worked well too.

Now, for the best part: eating it! I prefer to reheat a slice in the countertop oven these days rather than the microwave, for a better texture. Then, I put a dollop of plain, full fat Greek yogurt on top, followed by a drizzle of boiled apple cider (it lasts forever in the fridge, so I always keep some around). The boiled apple cider really brings out the apple flavor of the bake and more than makes up for the missing tablespoon of brown sugar. When you mix it with the tart yogurt, you end up with something that resembles a healthier, more breakfast-y version of cream cheese frosting. I love to spread it over the whole slice so that it’s like a little breakfast cake. When I make the pumpkin oatmeal bake, I do the same thing, except I use maple syrup instead of boiled apple cider. I’m sure that would work well for this too, although you wouldn’t get the hit of apple flavor.

Made this for Christmas breakfast and it was delicious! I had to bake mine for closer to an hour, perhaps because I used almond milk, or maybe it’s just my oven. I’m wondering what you think about adding another egg to this, or any of your other baked oatmeals. I had a couple sections that got a little more egg than others and had a sort of bread pudding-like taste to them, which I loved, so I’m wondering if making it more egg-y would affect any of the other ingredient ratios?

These were delicious! It was my first time baking with fresh cranberries and I think I am now going to look for some more recipes. I made the mixture up last night before bed and kept it in the fridge so all I had to do was put it in the oven this morning. My husband, toddler and I all enjoyed it!

I love baked oatmeal! I have modified this one to suit what I had on hand..chop up one apple, and use dried cranberries instead of fresh…I always use extra cinnamon (2 tbsp) and have started adding about 1/4-1/3 cup of ground flax for extra nutrition..yum yum!

Another delicious baked oatmeal recipe. I added some chopped nuts and replaced the brown sugar with some honey. This one came out super moist, although the apple flavor didn’t quite come through as much as I would have hoped. Maybe next time I’ll add a diced apple to the mixture. Thank you for the recipe! I tried baked oatmeal years ago and thought I just didn’t like it, because it always came out hard and dry, but yours have definitely changed my mind.

Not sure if you’re still reading comments on something this old, but I was wondering if I’d be able to use steel cut oats for this recipe instead of old-fashioned rolled oats? I have seen recipes for baked oatmeal using steel cut oats, but I’m not sure if I’d use the same two cups as listed in this recipe if I substituted old-fashioned for steel cut. Any idea?

You won’t be able to simply substitute in the steel cut oats because they take much more liquid and a much longer cooking time to soften. Unfortunately I haven’t tested it out with steel cut, so I can’t recommend alterations that would make it work. :(

I thought this was great! It was just what I was looking for. Unfortunately I didn’t have cranberries, but I used dried cranberries and raisins. I also threw in some sliced almonds because I had them. Great breakfast meal. It makes a nice big quantity so we’ll be eating it for a few days. I thought it was a little too sweet and not enough apple flavor came through (surprising based on the amount of apple sauce!). Next time I will chop up some fresh apple to add to it, and reduce the sweetener (I used honey). The texture was great and I ate it as pictured, heated up with milk over the top. Thanks!

Hi! I’m Beth

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